Sarah Versus the Power Outage
by Steampunk.Chuckster
Summary: Canon. Charah. Set towards the end of Season 3. A large part of LA is cast into darkness after a massive power outage, giving Sarah and Chuck time to reminisce and reflect.


**A/N:** A little one shot for my Chuckster readers/friends. Because I love you all. I thank you for every single word of mine that meets thine eyes.

This one shot exists in canon, towards the end of season 3, somewhere between Versus Role Models and Versus the Living Dead. Timing might be a bit wonky, but I honestly couldn't care less. Just work with me on this. (thumbs up)

 **Disclaimer:** I do not own CHUCK, nor do I own CHUCK's characters, and I am not profiting from this story. Except emotionally, mentally...I might make a few new friends, too. Fan fiction does that sometimes. Unless you're E.L. James. Then you can profit off of fan fiction because the publishing industry is currently a cesspool of idiots. WOT? Nothing. I said nothing. (whistles)

* * *

The streets were dark and empty. The power outage overtook more than half of Los Angeles, including Echo Park. According to reports coming in through Casey's NSA channel, everything between Westwood and Redondo Beach had been taken out as well, including LAX where many passengers were now stranded as flights were grounded.

"How is this even possible?"

Sarah looked up from where she was beaming her flashlight on the sidewalk, eyeing her boyfriend as he walked next to her waving his own around.

"We don't know yet, but we'll find out. Beckman has people on it."

"But this entire city has gone dark, pretty much. What kind of device could even _do_ that?"

"Plenty of devices can do that. It's just that usually nobody has the ability to get their hands on said devices."

"Somebody did."

"Apparently," she said quietly. "We just need to figure out who now."

"First we need to get home without being jumped or something." Sarah sent Chuck a look. And he read it correctly. "I mean, not that it'd be a problem for us. We'd kick ass. Or more specifically, you'd kick ass, and I'd kick whatever remaining ass there was…leftover. After you finished…kicking…most of the ass."

Sarah waited for a few seconds, staring at him with both eyebrows raised. When he glanced at her, she chirped, "No, keep going. Please."

His flat look got a giggle out of her.

"Chuck, it'll be fine. When we get home, we just have to wait for orders."

"How does this happen while we're at dinner, though? Like, why can't we ever have a nice date night? Do the bad guys _know_ we're having a nice date night? Is that it? It's not enough they want to take over the world, they also want to ruin our date nights?"

His arm fell over her shoulders and she tucked herself into his side, smirking.

"I'm not sure which one is more annoying to me," she said.

"I can answer that. I'd like to have dinner with my girlfriend for once and not have it interrupted by an asshole with world domination on his or her to-do list." He grumbled in frustration and pouted. It was an adorable combination in the light from the half-moon above them.

"Seconded. I barely got through half of my sirloin. Bastards."

He chuckled and she tucked herself even further into his warmth, nuzzling his coat collar and liking the way it felt against her cheek.

It took another ten minutes, but they finally stepped into the courtyard of their complex, passing the fountain and stopping at their front door. "Lights are off," Chuck said as he took out his keys. "Looks like Morgan's not home." And then he gave her a cheesy drawn out "Haaaa. Just kidding. Power outage."

Sarah rolled her eyes and stepped inside the apartment as Chuck opened the door for her. She slid a knife into her hand from her coat sleeve and inspected the place carefully.

"Morgan?" she heard Chuck call out as he stepped in after her, shutting the door behind him. The flashlights they bought at the second hand store on the way home from the restaurant, along with the batteries that had not been included and cost almost more than the actual flashlights, were really coming in handy tonight.

When there was no response, she felt more than saw Chuck's shrug. "Guess he really isn't home."

Sarah agreed and started setting up candles. The heater was off because of the power outage, but the warmth had stayed inside the apartment for the most part, and she found she was still warm enough when she peeled off her coat and hung her scarf in the closet.

Now that the room was filled with warm, flickering candle light, Sarah plopped down on the couch with her phone. "Nothing. No signal even."

"How do we get our orders?"

"Casey will pop in, I'm sure. He knows we're here."

"How do you know that?" Chuck asked. "Want me to head over real quick and let 'im know?"

"He was peeking out of his drapes when we walked into the courtyard."

Chuck blinked. "Sometimes your observational talents scare me a little. And this isn't coming from your partner. I'm talking like…as your boyfriend, it kinda makes me nervous."

She let out a huff of amusement. "Don't try to lie to me and it won't be a problem for you, Bartowski."

His smile was slow and warm, and when he sat down next to her, they came together inherently, their bodies melting into the couch and into one another. She reveled in how comfortable they were, and how perfectly his arms fit around her form, how perfectly her back molded to his chest, and how she didn't have to strain to tilt her head up and kiss the underside of his jaw.

"The fact that this was most likely done by someone who more or less wants to kill us aside, I really like power outages," he finally said after a few minutes of comfortable silence. "I mean, not super long ones that are crippling for a city's infrastructure and economy and all that. But like, those ones that happen in thunder storms, and when you wake up the next morning, the power's completely fine again. And you have to walk through the house resetting electronic clocks and making sure the fridge is at the right temperature and yadda yadda. It was so fun. Like an adventure. A chance to step away from the computer and the TV and video games, pull out the candles, read a book or tell ghost stories."

Sarah was quiet, smiling a little at how wistful and reminiscent Chuck sounded as he spoke softly into her ear, his breath fanning her hair and making her shiver in pleasure. But underneath that, she realized she didn't have nice memories like that when it came to power outages. Hers were…tainted. N some ways, they were bitter memories. Filled with guilt.

So she stayed curled up against him, not saying a word.

"I remember this time when I was maybe twelve or thirteen…The power went out. And it was the first time that had happened when our parents weren't around. It was just me and Ellie. My dad had been gone for the last month or so. We went out back and built our own fire pit where we roasted marshmallows. We only had Saltines, not graham crackers, so we ended up having marshmallows sandwiched between Saltines."

"Ew," she giggled.

"I mean, it wasn't amazing. But it wasn't awful."

Sarah giggled again. "Sounds nice."

"It was. I mean, my dad was pissed about the scorched lawn once he came back a few weeks later. But it was totally worth it."

She leaned back a little to look up at him, waiting for him to look down and meet her gaze before she spoke. "You're not building a fire on our property."

Chuck laughed, and she let herself enjoy the way his chest bounced against her back, his arms tightening around her torso and pulling her even closer. "Fine. But only because you said so."

"Good."

They were quiet for a bit, and Sarah thought back to a moment on the train in Paris, a few months earlier.

It had been the middle of the night and their bodies were satiated and spent, but their minds buzzing, fully awake.

Earlier that day, she'd woken up to find Chuck rushing to her side, her memory hazy and her head a little achy. Not five minutes later, she'd hung up on General Beckman of the NSA and had Chuck underneath her, almost completely undressed. It was that moment that had changed the trajectory of her life. It was that moment that had given her hope for something more, a happiness she'd never deemed possible, a happiness she used to think she didn't need, and what's more, didn't deserve.

And it was that moment that had set off a trigger in Chuck. He'd been so caught up in the passion and emotion of it all, so caught up in the fact that she was giving him a part of herself she hadn't given him before, that he'd begun grappling for more and more and more. He'd asked her questions, assuming the fact that they were both giving in to their love meant she was immediately willing to tell him _everything_. It didn't take long for him to figure out that this wouldn't be the case.

After years of keeping things close, after years of suppressing her past and the things she'd done then, it wasn't like she could just drop the barriers like it was nothing. However, Chuck had surged forward, expecting the floodgates to open, and when there was instead a mere trickle after the first day they spent locked in their train compartment, he'd been quick to understand, and he'd been just as quick to pull back a little.

It had made her fall in love with him that much harder. Granted, he hadn't become tentative in his questioning, not like he'd been before they became a real couple. He was still earnest and bold. And when she got that look, nibbling the inside of her cheek or diverting her gaze, he just chuckled with a teasing "Fiiiiiine" and changed the subject.

That night, as they laid in one another's arms, so warm and content, he'd asked her about her dad. And whether or not she knew where he was, or what he was doing. She'd simply said no and shrugged. And then came one of those rare times after they slept together that he _had_ seemed tentative about his question.

He'd asked about her childhood with her dad.

Maybe she hadn't wanted to ruin the mood. Things were intimate and passionate and the electricity was hovering between them. Everything was just so perfect. She felt like they were untouchable. Like nothing could invade this sanctuary they'd jumped into head first.

Or maybe it was that she just wasn't ready to tell him all of the cons she'd pulled with her dad, things she'd done when she was old enough to know they were wrong. When naivety was no longer an excuse.

So she crawled onto him, acting on the buzz she'd felt between her legs ever since he started caressing her thigh with his fingers.

Chuck knew what she was doing, and she knew he knew, but they both lost themselves in the heat and passion that neither of them seemed to be able to get enough of.

As Sarah sat in the darkness of their apartment now, with Chuck's arms around her, his lips pressed against her temple, she thought about the months that spanned between that night and this particular moment. She'd done a lot of growing, a lot of opening up, since then. But she'd still never felt like opening that can of worms.

Chuck had proven he'd love her no matter what. And she wasn't afraid of losing that because of a few illegal things she'd done with her dad as a kid and teenager. He knew about the people she'd killed for the CIA, didn't he? And he'd seen it firsthand when she was protecting him. That hadn't changed his feelings for her, nor had it dimmed her worth in his eyes. It was part of what made him so perfect to her.

It was just that it was hard to say things like that out loud, still. It was hard for her to be vulnerable, even if she knew inherently that Chuck could be trusted. She did trust him. And it was still hard.

Nevertheless, as she stared into the candlelight flickering on the table in front of her, she spoke up. Quietly. Because there was no buzz of the fridge in the kitchen behind them. There was no trickling of the fountain in the courtyard outside.

There was nothing but them.

"When I was fourteen, my dad and I were in a suburb just outside Boise. There was a tornado that had just gone through the place and it cut a good bit of their town's power off." She paused, feeling Chuck behind her and recognizing that he was literally holding his breath as she spoke. It was almost reassuring when she continued speaking and felt his chest move with breath again. "We used it to our advantage. The darkness provided us with a lot of cover, and alarm systems were on the fritz. We hit houses without cars in the driveway, took what we could, and loaded up the station wagon. Got thousands and thousands from what we stole that night." She blinked, remembering the look on her dad's face as they drove out of Idaho and into Oregon. "He was really proud of me. And that meant more to me than anything," she admitted.

Chuck's hand turned underneath where hers rested upon it and he threaded their fingers together, squeezing. She wondered if he was trying to be reassuring, or if it was just a gesture of affection. Did he think she needed reassurance? And if so, for what?

She shook her head a little and continued.

"I don't know. I guess—I guess that memory is tainted, though."

"Why?" he asked.

"My dad was building me into a con artist like him. That pride I felt in that moment came from somewhere dishonest."

"Mmmm," he hummed thoughtfully, his voice higher pitched than usual. Sarah could hear his disagreement in the sound.

"What?"

"I don't see it that way, I guess." She gave him a long look as he paused, meeting her gaze. "The pride you saw in him wasn't dishonest. In fact, I'm sure he really was proud of you…honestly, sincerely proud of you. Sure, stealing from people is pretty dishonest, but that doesn't mean he wasn't proud of his daughter."

She didn't say anything, letting his words settle in her mind.

"I think you're allowed to feel good about those sorts of moments in your life, no matter what the situation was. If it made you feel good then, you shouldn't let now—the present—tarnish that. Warm memories about your dad being proud of you—whether you helped him rob houses or helped him, I don't know, _paint_ houses—you gotta hold onto those, if you can. Because you never know when the source is gonna…run out."

I stared into his face for awhile and even though I thought I knew what he meant, I asked, "What do you mean?"

"Uh…" He licked his lips, looking for a better way to phrase what he was trying to say. "We never really know what tomorrow may bring, you know? So you have to get what you can out of the present, and out of the past. My—My dad is off somewhere being his usual…mysterious computer genius self. Off the grid. As it were. Once again, I have no idea when I'll see him next. For all I know, I might never see him again. So…in spite of all of the bad moments he gave me throughout my life, I choose not to let those ruin the good moments. Like the memories I have from before my mom left, when we were a seemingly happy and normal family. Or the time my dad and I spent a whole weekend in the San Bernardino mountains. Just us guys, he said." There was real warmth and love in his voice. It set Sarah at ease, made her melt into him even more. She felt safe when he talked like this. Safe from everything.

"And you don't know if you'll ever get anymore good moments," she finished for him. And then she felt like she had to say, "You will, Chuck. You'll see him again. He's probably protecting us now, in his own way. Wherever he is."

He squeezed her tightly then, kissing her temple.

"You'll get good moments, too, baby. With your dad. I know it."

They stayed quiet, then, and only moved when Casey knocked on their door with orders from Beckman. Their own good moment was interrupted by duty. There was an amateur troublemaker they had to nab in Torrance.

But neither of them would forget what had transpired between them before Casey's arrival. Not that night, not the next morning…not ever.

* * *

 **A/N:** That bit of foreshadowing actually hurt. :(

Please let me know what you thought about it! I'd love to read some of _your_ words! Love you all!

-SC


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